


Intersections

by daasgrrl



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Accidents, Alternate Reality, Angst, Coma, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-02-16
Updated: 2007-02-16
Packaged: 2017-11-24 02:41:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/629387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daasgrrl/pseuds/daasgrrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/elynittria">elynittria</a> put it - kind of a variation on the Schrodinger’s Cat experiment, but with Wilson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Beta:** Thank you very much to [evila_elf](http://archiveofourown.org/users/evila_elf/pseuds/evila_elf%22) for trusty beta, and additional thanks to [bironic](http://archiveofourown.org/users/bironic) and [elynittria](http://archiveofourown.org/users/elynittria) for excellent corrections, advice, and soothing pats.
> 
> Written for [Nightdog_Barks](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Nightdog_Barks/pseuds/nightdog_barks), as a thank you for the lovely [2 Tbsp Elephants](http://community.livejournal.com/house_wilson/900653.html). 
> 
> A key story idea was stolen with generous permission from [evila_elf](http://archiveofourown.org/users/evila_elf/pseuds/evila_elf) , but whereas she envisaged it with House as the subject, I substituted Wilson, which made all the difference to writing this. Thanks sweetie! I should also point out that I've used 'my' David from [Nothing Left to Lose](http://daasgrrl.livejournal.com/8002.html), who should not be confused with other Davids *g*. Also, while I’m sure medical inaccuracies abound, the alteration of the pharmaceutical trade name is deliberate. Finally, much love to my f-list for such helpful and encouraging feedback and crit.

Light. He remembers light.

There are other things he remembers, of course - the split-second terror, the rush of blood and adrenalin through his limbs, the _oh, fuck_ that starts somewhere in his brain but never makes it out of his lips. Then a tremendous force that _pushes_ him like the hand of a wrathful God. At first nothing but the shock of impact, and then pain, and a fragmentary moment when his brain still insists on fleeing even though the damage is already done. Then nothing.

He comes to consciousness slowly, in the darkness. He can hear the beep of the heart monitor and the quiet hiss of ventilation equipment and he knows this isn’t death, not yet. But there’s _something_ wrong, because he can’t seem to make anything work. His eyes will not open, and his mouth will not move to form words. It’s as though all the vital connections have been broken. He quickly realizes that not only is the expected pain failing to eventuate, but he can’t feel _anything_ \- not the pillow under his head or the mattress against his back, although he knows they must be there. He’s a disembodied presence floating in infinite blackness. The only thing that keeps him from overwhelming panic is the voice in the darkness, so he struggles to calm himself - a struggle not reflected in the steady beep of the heart monitor - and listens.

It’s a woman’s voice, calling his name softly. It’s his first name, not his last, and that just adds to the wrongness of it all. It must be very bad. But at least it’s a voice he recognizes. _Lisa?_ he asks her, meeting her first name for first name. _What the hell happened? Am I going to die?_ And she pauses in her summoning, and for a moment he thinks she’s heard him. But then she just says his name again in that soft, urgent tone. _I’m right here_ , he says, bewildered, but there’s only the hissing and the beeping that answer for him.

“That’s enough.” Another voice, much harsher and deeper, cuts her off, but its presence brings inexpressible relief. House will realize he’s in here; he has to. Even if no one else can tell, House will see that he’s here, he’s all right. Whatever’s the matter with him, House will figure it out. If only he could do something, use anything, to communicate, but all he can do is listen. There is a long silence, and then he hears the muffled clack of heels on linoleum, the slide of a closing door. The sound of a chair rolling on castors, coming closer, and the single thump of House’s cane on the floor. He imagines House sitting there, resting his chin on the top of the handle in his thinking pose. _House?_ he yells. _For God’s sake, do something!_

“Fuck, Jimmy,” he hears House say, and only then does the panic return, but with it a thankful oblivion.

 

***

 

There are new voices when he wakes. A woman is crying and screaming and a man is yelling at her. But what’s odd about them is how distant they sound, how some vital edge has been taken away so that the voices are flat, drained of innate emotion. It makes him worry that even his hearing is failing, but now other sounds are coming in loud and clear - beep, beep, thunk, hiss. There’s an annoying crackle by his left ear, louder than all the other sounds, even drowning out the hysteria of the screaming woman.

With a huge flood of relief, he realizes he is back in his body. He can feel it almost coalesce around him. The lights are back, so very bright, trying to burn their way through his eyelids. There’s a tube in his mouth which is scratching the back of his throat uncomfortably, and his head hurts a little. Actually, everything hurts a little, but it’s the dull, distant ache of long-term discomfort, not the sharp pain of trauma. He feels weak and nothing wants to move, but he feels _there_. He groans a little, or at least he tries, but no sound comes out. However, the heart monitor responds to his efforts; the beeps speed up just a little, and if he could just open his eyes he would be able to see the waves spiking closer together. He tries this, only to immediately shut them against the light.

There’s the crackling by his ear again, but this time there’s the sense of movement, of something being taken away, and then a hand touches his cheek. A facial muscle twitches in response. He feels strangely triumphant, even though it had nothing at all to do with him. And then his left eyelid is being pried open and the light, the light is too fucking bright, and he blinks and shifts away from it as best he can.  
  
 _Stop that,_ he snaps, but the muscles merely tighten uselessly around the tube in his throat, and then a hand pries open his other eye and does the same thing. This time he manages to flail one hand weakly in protest, but as the bright circle of light moves away his eyes finally decide they can stand it after all. The first thing he manages to focus on is a rectangle of light up high in the corner with shadows on it. The shadows are moving a little, and he realizes they’re still yelling at each other.

“After this amount of time,” a voice says, and he recognizes it, and his eyes flick to the left with relief. House is looking past him, up into the corner, and there is a rustle as he puts down the penlight and picks up the chip packet again. “You’d think you could have waited for the commercial break.”

Wilson wants to smile, but the effort is too much for him and he closes his eyes again for a moment. _It’s going to be all right_ , he thinks.

Then there’s a burst of music and the volume suddenly seems to go up a level before the whole thing is sharply muted. He opens his eyes again. House is looking at him now, but there’s something _wrong_ with his expression. Wilson gets the feeling of being studied, like a specimen under a microscope, a curiosity. House has never looked at him like that in his life, not that he can remember, anyway. He’s well aware that House has many moods, from melancholy to playful to exasperated, but it’s like nothing he’s seen before. Wilson is being _examined_ , and he doesn’t like it at all. _What are you looking at?_ he wants to ask. _What’s wrong?_ He’d have thought House could at least look a little pleased, if not exactly overwhelmed with joy. Instead there’s just his steady, inquisitive gaze.

“How nice to finally make your acquaintance,” House says conversationally, and his mild amusement is frightening. Everything’s all right now, but yet it’s all completely wrong. _House_ is wrong. He tries to tell House to stop whatever the hell he’s playing at, right now, but the endotracheal tube completely silences him, and he’s reduced to mouthing helplessly. If House notices his agitation, he ignores it.

House pokes and prods him a little more, and then gathers the remains of his lunch and leaves the room. Within minutes two nurses rush in. One of them, a young and attractive brunette he doesn’t immediately recognize, bends over him and meets his eyes with something like awe.

“Can you hear me?” she says. 

Wilson blinks, in what he hopes is a meaningful manner. _Jody,_ he thinks, _or maybe Jennifer_. He can’t quite see her name tag to confirm. “Yes,” he mouths helpfully.

She turns back to the other nurse. “I think he’s really there,” she says, her voice rising in excitement.

After that there is a flurry of doctors and nurses, and he recognizes Jervis and Louise, and not long after that Foreman puts in an appearance, but everyone keeps calling him ‘sir’ and shooting him disbelieving looks even as they examine him. He keeps waiting for someone, anyone, to call him by name, to see a flicker of familiarity instead of the impersonal concern, but they just come and go and talk around and above him. There are scribbled notes on clipboards and a hundred different examinations, in which he manages to successfully prove that he is both conscious and capable of keeping his own upper airway unobstructed, even if he can’t sit up without assistance. Eventually someone is convinced enough to take the damn tube out of his throat, although they leave the ones in his nose, veins and bladder. By this time he’s exhausted, and when they’re done with the procedure he sleeps again, despite his bewilderment.

 

***

 

He hears more sounds in his dreams, fading in as though from a great distance. He recognizes the voices of his mother and father, low and hushed at first - did they really come all the way from New England? - and all of a sudden his mother’s voice rises an octave and then she is actually keening, making long, inarticulate sounds of grief. It’s a horrible sound. He would do anything to stop her making it, but it seems his options are completely non-existent. His father’s voice murmurs in low counterpoint, and Wilson can almost see him standing there, one arm curled awkwardly around his sobbing wife.

House is there too, and Foreman. Their voices are a little further away, and eerily calm when it’s quiet enough for them to speak. They’re talking about coma scales. Wilson is an 8 out of 15 on the GCS, which means his condition is ‘severe’. Apparently, a thumb pressed firmly above the eyes will make them flicker open in response to the pain, and his body will flinch away from a pinprick in an automatic effort to protect itself. He will swallow automatically if something is placed on his tongue. Sometimes he will make small noises that mean nothing. But these things take time, Foreman continues, after the recitation of his abilities. It hasn’t been that long. There’s still hope. _How long?_ Wilson wants to know, but no one listens to him. There is a short silence, and then his mother starts up again.

 

***

 

When he wakes, she’s sitting in a chair by his bedside. He can hear the soft tapping of her pen on the clipboard before he opens his eyes.

“Hi,” she says as he turns toward her, all professional sympathy and warmth. “I’m Doctor Cameron.”  
 _  
I know that, for God’s sake_ , he thinks, and swallows, trying to clear his throat in preparation for speech. She helps him sit up and makes him sip water slowly from a plastic cup, then sets him back against the pillows.

“Doctor House sent me to see how you were doing,” she says, waiting for his response. He nods.

“House,” he manages to rasp out. It feels like the first thing he’s said in a very long time.

She smiles. “That’s right. He was with you when you… regained consciousness.”

“Need to talk… to him.”

Her smile fades a little, like a dying flower. “He’s a little busy at the moment, but I’ll ask him to drop by. If you wouldn’t mind answering a couple of questions?”

Wilson nods, not having the strength to argue. He feels slightly light-headed and disoriented.

“Do you remember your name?”

“James Wilson,” he says, frowning as he sees her making a note of that. “You didn’t… know that?”

She ignores him. “And what do you remember?”

“Cameron, it’s me. You work for House, along with Chase and Foreman. Your specialty is immunology and House hired you because he thought you were attractive. You were married, once. He had cancer.” It’s a lot to get out at once, and it hurts his throat, but Wilson is losing patience with this entire situation.

She looks startled, but only for a moment, and he has to admire her composure as she carefully makes another note on her clipboard.

“Well, it sounds like your awareness was just fine while you were under. You’ve really made an amazing recovery. People are calling it miraculous.”

“What’s House calling it?”

“ _Doctor_ House,” she emphasizes the first word reprovingly, “wanted me to ask you these questions.”

“I really need to see him,” Wilson says. He still clings to the ridiculous hope that House will somehow be able to come up with a plausible explanation for all this.

“I’ll let him know,” she says. “Now, do you know where you are?”

He sighs and answers all her preliminary questions easily, feeling the exhaustion creeping back.

“You seem…remarkably well informed,” she says finally, cautiously. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

He hesitates, but then describes the lights, and the push, and the pain. She nods.

“The police report says hit and run. They never found him.”

Wilson nods. “Now you tell me something. Why doesn’t anybody seem to know who I am?”

“Mr. Wilson…” she hesitates, then goes on in a rush. “You were brought here because… well, because originally you were brought into Princeton General without any ID. No one knew who you were, whether you had family, or insurance. We offered to take over your care in exchange for being able to… to let students…get an idea of…”

“Living case study,” Wilson says. She ducks her head in embarrassment. “I see.”

He lifts his left hand and examines the white plastic bracelet on it for the first time. After ‘name’ is printed: JOHN DOE (12). His date of birth is listed as UNKNOWN EST 1972.

“Nineteen-sixty-nine,” he says. “You were off by three years.”

She makes a note. “You look younger.”

“Thanks. I think. So this isn’t some kind of warped joke. You really don’t know who I am.”

“I’m sorry, but I’ll make sure the file is updated…”

“How long was I… like that?” He had been shocked by the thinness of his arms and legs when he first caught a glimpse of them, the muscles wasted. He must have been unconscious for a very long time. Maybe as long as a year.

Cameron - Doctor Cameron - places a hand on his arm. “Are you sure you want to hear it now? You were… under for a very long time.”

“I want to know,” he insists. “Tell me.” If he could have, he would have snatched the file out of her hand.

She speaks slowly, pausing to gauge the impact of her words. “It happened in 1996,” she said. “It’s been almost eleven years.”

 

***

 

When he sleeps again, the voices return. Things are quieter now, which must be an improvement. There’s still the sound of the heart monitor, but the slow hiss of the ventilator is gone.

“You can’t do that, House.” It’s Cuddy again, and her tone is so exasperated and so familiar that he wants to weep. “We have programs…”

“Which are useless,” House snaps. “Soothing music and deep massage twice a day? That would bore me _into_ a coma. It’s nowhere near enough. The only proven success is with around-the-clock stimulation.”

“We don’t have the space.”

“Isolation has plenty of space, and all the mod-cons.”

“Except it’s supposed to be used for _isolation_.”

“Fine. If someone comes in with Ebola, I’ll move.” 

In his mind’s eye he can almost see House’s glare, the set of his jaw. He wakes up to the sound of Cuddy’s sigh.

 

***

 

The next day, he does get to see House again, and it somehow disturbs him more than anything that has gone before. It’s still House, and yet it isn’t. This time Wilson is composed enough to notice the things he’d missed in their last encounter. The limp is still there, and House is using a cane, but he seems to lean on it less heavily than the House he’s accustomed to. This House’s posture is significantly more upright. He’s a little heavier, and the lines in his face less deeply drawn. But even more unsettlingly, this House is almost - normal.

“You wanted to see me,” he says, with a theatrical flourish. “Not getting enough attention from the other doctors?”

“So… I’m no one you know at all,” Wilson can already tell from his manner, but he needs to hear it from House himself. “To you, I’m just… coma guy.”

“Technically, not any more,” House points out. “Now you’re miracle guy. I’ve had to completely rework my lunch schedule.”

“But you’ve never actually met me. I’m just some patient to you. And yet you’re here anyway… because I wanted to see you?”

House shrugged. “According to Cameron. Although she is a known liar.”

“But you… never see patients just because they want to see you.”

“I don’t?” House considers for a moment. “Maybe that’s because none of them ever do.” He smirks a little, still looking at Wilson as though wishing he could take him apart and see how he works, but there’s something missing there, something important. Wilson can’t quite put his finger on it. “ _Especially_ not the healthy ones. It’s interesting, though. Cameron says you seem to know an awful lot for someone who’s spent the last eleven years as a cabbage. Your speed of recovery is completely unprecedented - I would have said impossible. If I didn’t know better, I’d have said you’d been faking it. For eleven years. Must have been dull.”

The conversation just keeps getting weirder. House is actually being quite pleasant, for House, and it appears to be genuine.

“Your leg,” Wilson says, and gestures accordingly. “You had an infarction, right?”

House’s eyes narrow for a moment. “I see what she means,” he says.

“But something’s… different. The myectomy wasn’t as severe, maybe?”

The question makes House look at him with suspicion, but he answers anyway. “No myectomy. They put me in a coma for the pain. Not _quite_ as long as yours, obviously. It doesn’t work as well as it used to, but I manage.”

“You must be taking something for the pain.”

“I bulk-buy Ibuprofen.”

And then it strikes him. He does remember this House after all, but it’s been a long time.

“Stacy. You’re still with her.”

“Amazing what people talk about when they don’t think anyone’s listening. It was Cuddy, wasn’t it? She‘s always been the jealous type.”

“But it’s true.”

“I don’t see why I bothered. The amount of gossip you were taking in, you didn’t _need_ TV.”

“Then why do I think I know you?”

House shrugs. “We’ve been having lunch for years. You weren’t much of a conversationalist, but I always appreciated that about you.”

“Not… not like that,” Wilson struggles to explain. “I _know_ you. You went to Johns Hopkins and then Michigan. Your parents are John and Blythe. You grew up all over, and once had a dog called Guru, because of some obscure joke in Mandarin. You TiVo New Yankee Workshop and have some weird _thing_ against mushrooms. You either own or want to buy a motorbike even though you’re the last person who should be riding one, and you’d be willing to spend a thousand dollars on monster trucks.”

“Okay, who set me up? It was Foreman, wasn’t it? Man comes out of coma, develops ESP. I’m not signing off on his article.” He seems more amused than puzzled or annoyed, and his complete nonchalance annoys Wilson immensely.

“Fine. Ask me something none of your staff would know, something no one else would know. Not even Stacy.”

“Stacy knows everything.”

“Even about the hooker in DC? At the imaging conference?”

“Nothing happened!” House says, but he’s finally paying attention. “All right, I give up. How did you know about that?”

“You told me. _Because_ nothing happened, but you still felt guilty about letting her in, and you didn’t want the grief from Stacy. I am - I was - your best friend. Just not… here.”

“I don’t do ‘best friends’. And if not here, then where?”

Wilson sighs. “I don’t know. Somewhere else. I know it sounds crazy. But you… he’s… still there somewhere. I’ve been having… the weirdest dreams.”

“Not a shrink. And it sounds like you need one. But really, how did you know about the conference?”

“I told you.” Wilson stares him down as much as he is able.

“ESP.”

“No. Exactly what I said. You told me.”

House frowns at him a little longer, then pushes himself out of the chair. “You know that I’m not going to start feeling all… responsible… for you just because of some cheap party trick.”

“You can ask me some other things if you want.”

“No, thanks. Next thing I know you’ll be wanting to borrow money.” 

And Wilson laughs a little, because he’s not going to cry.

 

***

 

“Wilson?” There’s no mistaking the imperiousness of that tone, even in his dreams. His eyes flicker open reluctantly and automatically orient themselves towards the sound. In one startled instant he realizes that he can actually see, and it’s thrilling until he realizes he still can’t seem to move anything else. Nevertheless, it’s so much better than the endless darkness of his previous dreams.

He focuses a little better, and for a moment he thinks he’s somehow been moved into House’s office. House is standing there, with Cameron, Chase and Foreman sitting in chairs in a rough semi-circle around him. There’s a whiteboard with black marker all over it. But then he realizes House has set up camp in the other half of a hospital room. There are a couple of desks, computers, a bookshelf, a couch. The coffee machine is in its usual place next to the window. There are no potted plants, no conference table and no carpet, and it’s all gleaming silver instead of textured walls, but it does form some approximation of normal. Slowly he realizes they’re all looking at him. For some reason he particularly notices the startled look on Cameron’s face.

“That’s just creepy,” Chase says.

“It could be a coincidence,” Foreman says. “But if he’s responding to his name, it’s an improvement. We’ll see.”

“So, what do you think?” House yells at him from across the room. “Osteosarcoma?”

Wilson has no idea. He’s completely missed the beginning of the discussion. However, as he discovers, he has no way of conveying that he needs a recap. House waits for him a moment longer, and then impatiently returns everyone’s attention to the whiteboard.

 

***

 

The next few days are a blur of tests and therapy, sleeping and waking. It seems that everyone in the hospital wants to see him, to confirm the news of his ‘miraculous’ recovery. House seems to have lost interest after his initial survey - Wilson is, after all, better than he’s been for a long time and, in the absence of a relapse, has absolutely no need for his skills. 

Instead, his supervising physician Jenkins administers an unending barrage of tests that fill his every waking moment and, he suspects, some of his sleeping ones too. Therapists come in to help him gain enough strength to actually make it out of the bed. Students come in groups to marvel and take notes. One of the cleaning ladies creeps in late at night, wanting to touch his face, asking him to hold some kind of gold medallion in his hand for a moment, something with the face of Jesus. He does so, and then she thanks him profusely and leaves. It leaves him feeling somehow ashamed. Random staff members are constantly peering at him through the glass walls until he begs someone to draw the blinds. But there’s no sign of House, and he can’t quite bring himself to ask for him again. There’s even a short visit from Cuddy - Doctor Cuddy, he self-corrects - who smiles at him and asks how he’s doing. He wants desperately to tell her exactly how he’s doing, but doesn’t. There are people who want to do a story on him for the local news. He refuses, but they run one anyway, only without revealing his name.

It takes a week before they get around to sending him a ‘counselor’ - not quite a psychologist, but more of a hospital liaison. He still hasn’t told anyone about the dreams, and he’s not going to. Patricia looks to be in her late 40s, with dark shoulder-length hair, glasses, and sensible shoes. She seems genuinely caring - the first person who doesn’t care so much about where he’s been as much as where he’s going. 

The first thing she asks is about his family, whether he has any, whether he wants to try contacting them. The hospital will cover his phone bills, and supervise his recovery, but if he really does get better, he’s got to think about his future. He blinks. Considering the reactions of all the people he thought he knew, it hadn’t occurred to him that he might have family somewhere who weren’t wailing over his barely alive body. Even if they did exist here, something tells him that calling his parents would be a very bad idea. If he really has been gone for eleven years, his sudden reappearance is going to shock them badly. Rafe will probably be in London, if the patterns are similar, no way except to go through his parents for information on his whereabouts, and of course, David is… his eyes widen and he almost swears as the thought descends on him. The counselor looks at him curiously over her glasses. He doesn’t want to discuss it, but she promises him phone books.

In due course they arrive. He wishes he had internet access, but the old-fashioned ways should still work. By now he can sit up in bed unassisted, and he starts to leaf through the pages. The last job he remembers David holding was with Anderson and Fowler, a firm specializing in corporate law. They’re still in business, conveniently close to the front of the volume. He takes down the number, his hand shaking slightly from the effort, marring the shapes of the blue figures on the page. Somehow he knows, deep in his gut - it wasn’t _David_ who disappeared eleven years ago. It was him. Therefore, David is just fine. He must be. It makes a strange kind of innate sense. If he has ended up here, then maybe, just maybe, David has taken his place. The universe abhors a vacuum. He can imagine House saying that, and chooses not to think about that right now.

David no longer works for Anderson and Fowler, but at least they have him in their records. Wilson explains and pleads and charms as best he can, and eventually someone digs up the name of another law firm. He calls them and has to go through the whole process again. The third firm puts him through without a struggle, but he has to negotiate David’s secretary, who is plainly unaware that Wilson exists, and he has to explain all over again, glossing over the facts a little, before she transfers the call with reluctance. There is a long pause while she does so, and Wilson tries to steel himself as much as he can.

“Who is this, really?” and it is him, and Wilson doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. It’s almost worth it, all of it, that he gets to hear David’s voice again, even if it sounds faintly annoyed.

“David. It’s me. Jimmy,” Wilson says, using his childhood name. There is another silence, so long that Wilson rushes to fill it. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know who else to call, and…”

“This had better not be some kind of a joke,” David says, and Wilson can hear the shakiness in his voice.

“It’s not… I can explain…” 

“Where the hell have you been?” David has apparently already settled on the side of belief. “Fuck, Jimmy, do you know what you did to Ma? Everyone thought you were dead. _I_ thought you were dead. Are you going to call them? Where are you? Are you all right? Do you need help?”

Wilson sighs with relief. He even manages to be mildly amused at how quickly David has managed to segue from irritation to concern. He’s got his story prepared, which will not resemble the truth in any way - a combination of concussion and temporary amnesia and homelessness and shame and a lucky break. He doesn’t want David to know he’s actually gone completely out of his mind.

“Everything’s fine,” he says, and continues with his careful, caring lies. 


	2. Chapter 2

During these first few days he sleeps almost as much as he wakes, his body demanding rest every couple of hours at first. It’s almost like being a baby again. The dreams come one after the other, so achingly vivid.

Sometimes it’s Cameron, earnestly showing him photographs and flashcards and speaking to him as though he were about six years old. Or Chase, keeping up a running flow of clues and solutions including, once, a ten-letter word for ‘in a state where only involuntary bodily functions are sustained’ (very funny, Wilson thinks). However, both of them are preferable to Foreman, whose idea of stimulation apparently consists of reading him neurology articles.

Mostly, though, he’s stuck with House. In one dream he’s listening to Pink Floyd, thin white cables falling across his chest, even though House knows if he’s going to listen to the old stuff he’d much prefer The Beatles. Another time House is playing a video game at his side, the bleeps annoying as hell, and he’s entirely unimpressed at House’s high scores, which are waved in front of his face at the end of each level. Yet another, and House is reading him excerpts from People and showing him pictures of Britney Spears. When he wakes, he contemplates his dreams, and wonders whether House is trying to draw him back or annoy him to death. He supposes it would be a resolution, either way.

 

***

 

A few days after the phone call to David, House comes back into his room, lunch in hand, not bothering to ask leave before pulling over a chair. Lunch is the small window of time Wilson actually has to himself in the fullness of his days, but he’s not about to complain. He has his own tray in front of him - some kind of chicken pasta, a small plate of lettuce with a single wedge of tomato, orange juice and a cup of lime Jell-O. He’s convinced himself by now that hospitals are secretly sponsored by gelatin dessert companies. Once he can handle a wheelchair by himself, he’s heading straight to the cafeteria, where at least he’ll have more say in tormenting his tastebuds.

“So, what’s it like being Lazarus?” House says by way of greeting. He dumps his food haphazardly, and begins unwrapping something from a white paper bag.

“Not as fun as you might think,” Wilson says automatically, distracted by the appearance of real food. House’s lunch looks much more appetizing, if less nutritionally sound - some kind of melted ham and cheese thing with a bag of Lays and a milkshake. Wilson can smell the artificial strawberry flavor from where he’s sitting and although he’d usually never touch something like that, right now it’s weirdly appealing. He gauges the distance and his own co-ordination for a moment, and then makes a grab for the packet of chips on his nightstand. House’s hands are occupied with his sandwich and he has no chance at defense. Wilson tears open his prize happily.

“Now, that’s just low. Stealing from a cripple,” House says when he’s finished swallowing.

“I can’t even make it down the hall yet, much less the cafeteria,” Wilson points out, reaching into the bag again. “I win.”

House appears to concede the point, but conspicuously moves the other half of his sandwich to a ledge behind him. He leaves the milkshake on the nightstand, though, which Wilson takes as an invitation. House sighs and reaches for the orange juice instead.

“You don’t even care why I’m here, do you?” he says, popping the cap.

“To bring me lunch and ask me again how I knew that stuff about you. Because it’s been bugging you for over a week and you can’t work it out. I already told you.”

“The problem is that I don’t believe you. Actually, I don’t believe any of it. Eleven years. You should be barely able to drool the alphabet right now. But I saw you, week after week. I was there. The machines don’t lie. And Jenkins may be stupid, but his tests aren’t. You weren’t faking it. You couldn’t have been. And then there’s this whole ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ thing you have going which is even more annoying.”

Wilson shrugged, preoccupied. The pasta was looking slightly better now, and he pulled it towards him.

“‘Scream’ was way better.”

“But see, you shouldn’t know that. Because you would have slept through it. Literally.”

“I… must have heard people talking about it?”

“That, and everything else, it seems.”

“House, what do you want me to say?” Wilson doesn’t see any point in keeping up the pretense of calling him ‘Doctor’, even if it’s not the House he knows. “There was… I was in an accident. Somewhere. And when I woke up, I was here. Except here, I’ve been in a coma for eleven years, and no one has any idea who I am. I work… I worked here. I was Head of Oncology, believe it or not.”

“Well, that does it, you must be telling the truth. No one would actually dream about that job. Not even Windschuttle, and he has it.”

“It wasn’t that bad. Even though I worked next door to you. Except that I remember when you had the infarction, Stacy tried to save your life by insisting they remove the dead muscle tissue without your consent, which left you in constant pain. You started taking Vicodin. A lot of it. And then she left you. You’re… kind of a miserable jerk back there.”

“Hey, you don’t even know me. I’m doing pretty well here, too.”

“I know you. For you, this is happy.” Wilson smiles, and studies him for a moment. “Too? Does this mean you believe me?”

“Nope. Just humoring you.”

“That’s fine, as long as you remember to bring more food next time.”

“You know that even if you were studying, at 25 you would barely have been out of medical school. Unless those ‘learn oncology while you sleep’ programs really work.”

“Or unless I’m telling the truth.”

The next day, House brings to lunch some old patient charts, X-rays and MRI scans. Wilson doesn’t bother pointing out confidentiality issues and the breach of protocol involved. There’s no light box, so he has to hold them up to the lamp one by one, but he goes through them without too much difficulty. There are a couple of inconclusives, where the markers and the imaging are clearly at odds, and he suspects House has put them in deliberately. House listens with only the occasional question for clarification. Wilson almost feels like he’s giving a lecture, but he knows he’s the one being tested.

“So, do I pass?” he says when he’s finished, handing them all back in a pile.

“A bit slow on the multiple myeloma.”

“Only because you lied to me about the patient history.”

“Patients will do that to you.”

“They can’t lie about their M proteins!”

“Labs can lie, too.”

Wilson glares at him, but House just leaves, looking thoughtful.

 

***

 

Not long after, Wilson even dreams of lunch with House, although he still can’t move or speak. It’s fairly obvious to him that he’s having whatever is coming through the thin line of the nasogastric tube, but House seems to have other ideas. House is armed with an endless supply of cotton swabs, and is supplying Wilson with tastes of selected items, like it or not. Today, it’s a drop of coffee to start, and he can actually taste it, bitter on the tongue. He wishes House had at least put some sugar in it first. Something salty, maybe a dab of gravy from the box, which tastes a lot better than it should. A tiny shaving of chocolate that melts on his tongue, and another trickle of something that tastes like fruit-flavored yogurt. House repeats the cycle a few times, alternating the swabs according to his whim and his own eating patterns. It bothers Wilson that House is actually consuming the yogurt, considering his previous diatribes on its bacterial content.

Wilson sits there, swallowing obediently, ignoring the television in the corner in favor of watching House as he eats. It strikes him that House is looking more haggard than usual, and he wishes he could say something appreciative, something encouraging, but he can’t. House talks for both of them, but the strain is beginning to show in his voice.

 

***

 

Slowly, over weeks that stretch into months, he gets stronger. House continues to see him for lunch every other day and continues to supplement his diet with real food. He can walk okay now, although he needed a walking frame for a while, which both annoyed and amused him. During that phase, House would join him on the occasional stroll, just for the entertainment value. He’s still in demand, but the novelty has worn off, and new medical curiosities have arrived to supplant him. He feels he should be worried about the future, but he’s known almost from the start that for him, there is no future here. It’s not some melodramatic declaration of denial - it’s a feeling deep in his gut, something as immutable as steel meeting flesh on a dark highway. Even if there’s nothing to return to, he can’t stay here - where he doesn’t belong, where he doesn’t matter. It’s why he’s refused to tell David exactly where he is, even though he calls him every few days, and it’s why he hasn’t called his parents, or anyone else, at all. He enjoys his strange friendship with House, who continues to test him in a myriad of small ways, but it’s not his House. Already, he’s begun making plans, but there’s one thing he has to do first.

One evening he finally goes to meet David in a small Italian restaurant, his brother’s choice. They hadn’t wanted to let him out at all, but he argues that next week he’ll be leaving anyway, and it’s just for the one evening, and they finally agree. Patricia has found him some clothing, including a pair of shoes - the clothes he was found in are long gone, and he wouldn’t want to wear them anyway. He even has money - he probably could have coaxed some of that from the hospital coffers as well, but after one of House’s visits he had found a couple of hundred in the nightstand. He’s pretty sure he and House didn’t go any further than conversation, but he had taken it anyway.

Wilson is early - because, after all, what else does he have to do? - and he waits impatiently for his brother. The restaurant is cozy and warm, and smells of garlic and roasting meats. David is only five minutes late, and at the first sight of him something in Wilson tightens and twists. They’ve never been a particularly affectionate family, but all of a sudden Wilson is on his feet and they’re hugging each other tightly, without words. Wilson is surprised at the strength of his brother’s response, but then he supposes David hasn’t seen him for a while, either. He can smell the tang of David’s aftershave and the dampness of his coat from the intermittent rain, and it’s these more than anything else that convince him that David is real, that he’s actually there. Before he realizes it, he’s wiping at his eyes and a couple of people are staring at them. He mumbles some kind of embarrassed general apology, turns his face away, and sits down.

He’s sure the food is good, but he has no idea what he eats. He just wants to watch and listen, and store this memory somewhere against the future he might not have. David seems a little more relaxed, but then, thinks Wilson, he doesn’t know. He thinks this is a new beginning. He’s full of questions, and Wilson does his best to evade the ones he doesn’t want to answer, as he’s been doing all along. He only wants to hear about family, and friends, and reminisce about things that happened long ago.

Afterward, they go to a small, dimly lit bar and sit in upholstered bucket seats, and David has a glass of wine, although Wilson sticks to water. Finally, Wilson dares to ask the thing he’s wanted to know since he woke up.

“David, I really need to ask you - before I disappeared - what was I doing? What was happening in my life?”

“You really don’t remember anything.”

“I wouldn’t be asking you if I did.”

“Well, you were in med school, and Sara was supporting you - was it Sara?”

Wilson nods absently. He still remembers proposing to her - the way everything had been just right that evening, the restaurant, the flowers on the table, the smell of her hair. The ring had been tiny, but he had thought he could make it up to her later on, when he started earning a decent amount of money.

“So you do remember.”

“It’s complicated. Go on.”

“Then in your finals year, she left you. We never found out why. You seemed okay for a while, but then you skipped out on all your exams and disappeared. We kept waiting for a phone call, if not from you, then from the police. But we never got one.”

“I’m sorry.”

David leans over and touches his arm lightly.

“You kept telling me to be patient, and keep quiet, and I have. But I want to know what’s happening. Where are you staying? And when are you going to call Ma? She’s going to kill me when she finds out I’ve known you were alive for weeks and not told her.”

“She can’t find out.”

“Why? You’re going to need someplace to stay, get your life back together. You could stay with us if you really need to, but I think they’re going to want you home for a while.”

“I can’t… I’m not going to… I can’t stick around here for much longer.”

“Why in hell not?”

“It’s complicated.”

“Stop saying that. Whatever it is, we can fix it. Is someone looking for you? To hurt you in some way?”

“No, nothing like that. Well, maybe the looking part. I just… I have to. And I’m sorry. I just wanted to see you again. To say goodbye.”

“You can’t do this. You can’t just reappear after eleven years and then disappear again. You know that I… the reason that Marisa and I are still in New Jersey… I wanted to be here. Just in case. For years, I used to go… look for you, sometimes. Where I last saw you. Hoping you might show up someday, that you’d remember me.”

“I’m sorry,” Wilson says. He’s stuck on repeat, but there seems nothing more he can say. There have been too many lies already. Maybe he shouldn’t even have made that first phone call, but it’s what he would have wanted if he were in David’s place, and in a way, he is. This one evening is all they’re going to get; it has to be enough, for both of them. “I was just so screwed up, I didn’t think you’d want to see me. But I remembered you.”

“Jimmy, you’re not going to… do anything stupid, are you?”

“I really… hope not.” Wilson’s always been the sensible one, but in this situation he really doesn’t know what constitutes reasonable behavior.

When they leave, he half expects that David will try and follow him back to the hospital, but after another desperate hug he just stands in the middle of the street, watching Wilson go.

 

***

 

That night, he dreams that he opens his eyes to find that his mother and father are back in the room. They’ve got a canvas bag with them, and he thinks at first that they’ve gone grocery shopping in some kind of bizarre displacement activity, but then he realizes the flowers and fruit and coffee are for him. In a way. They hold the items up to his face one by one, forcing him to inhale their scent. His mother looks composed, dedicated, while his father sits by her and helps retrieve and remove the objects one by one. It’s faintly ridiculous, if touching, and Wilson suspects that somewhere, House is watching and laughing his ass off. He struggles to see as much of the room as he can, given that he still can’t seem to move anything but his eyes, and that some of his vision is being blocked by a large grapefruit. It turns out he’s wrong about House. Wilson spots him lying on the couch, which is not quite long enough for his lanky frame. He appears to be taking a nap.

 

***

 

Soon after that, he finally has official permission to go. Patricia has helped him as much as possible, getting his social security details, applying for an ID card, a copy of his birth certificate, helping him write to his former schools for copies of their records, all to be sent care of her address so that he can pick them up when they arrive. He won’t be needing any of it, but it seems to make her happy. The doctors all want to keep track of him, for the sake of their future research papers - one by one, they ask him where he’ll be, and he takes their cards and promises to let them know. Foreman isn’t one of them, and he’s slightly relieved, considering the way Foreman always looks at him whenever he’s dropped by House’s office. As though he shouldn’t exist. He makes review appointments two weeks into the future, which he won’t be keeping. He hugs the nurses and the therapists and tries to tell them how grateful he is. Even Cuddy comes by to wish him well, and he thanks her for the excellent care. She seems to have put on a little weight around the abdomen, but he doesn’t comment on it.

House has been quietly absent during the mad rush of farewells, but Wilson knows where he’ll be. And he’s there, with his feet up on the table and his people around him. As he appears in the doorway, House looks up, and the fellows turn their heads. Foreman looks suspicious, Cameron mildly irritated, and Chase indifferent. He knows his friendship with House has been noted around the hospital and remarked upon by many, usually with amusement. The only person who could possibly see House as a friend is someone who’s been cut off from human contact for eleven years and was too helpless to run away. But not only has he been grateful for House’s company, he needs him, and now more than ever - his future also depends on him.

“Mr. Wilson!” House greets him, in a deliberate effort to annoy both Wilson and his own staff. It works. House stands up, throws Foreman the file, and shoos the trio out of the room with his hands.

“If you’ll excuse us, we have important matters to discuss.”

“What, General Hospital?” Chase comments.

“It’s a crappy show,” Wilson says, “but at least it’s consistent.”

That earns him more looks on their way out. House has the ghost of a smile on his face, but it quickly turns serious as Wilson approaches him.

“I’m checking out,” Wilson says. He means it to be ironically funny, but it falls flat in the silence. House sits back down.

“There’s nothing I can say, is there?”

“No,” Wilson says. They’ve had this conversation already, in quiet places. More than once. He feels that it’s somewhat ironic that he’s waited this long, but he wanted his physical independence and freedom first, and most importantly, to be away from here. “Either you believe me, and you’ll help me, or I’ll find some other way. It just won’t be as reliable. I could end up back here. That would be funny, don’t you think?”

Obviously, House doesn’t. He holds Wilson’s gaze for another moment, then sighs and reaches into the bottom drawer of the desk, pulling it all the way out to access the contents at the back. He brings out a slim black case. Wilson glances behind him quickly, just to see if anyone can see them, but his body should be blocking any casual view. House hands it over and Wilson unzips it. Inside are three hypodermic needles, for redundancy, and a multi-dose vial of high concentration sodium pentobarbital in the form of Narbutal. Warnings are plastered over it in red and black lettering.

“You’ll need all of it,” House says quietly. “I’m assuming you still remember how, although you can practice on something first if you need to.”

“Thank you,” Wilson says, and slips the case into his backpack. “I’m not even going to ask how you got it.”

“That’s good, because I’m not telling you.”

“But you did. Which means you do believe me.”

House looks away, and his lips twist as though he is tasting something unpleasant. “‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth’,” he quotes, staring out at the balcony. “Or maybe in this case the impossible is the truth. I can’t tell anymore.”

He turns back to Wilson. “But I can see how you could have been my friend. Or his friend.”

Another pause, and then he adds, “I believe you.”

Wilson nods in acknowledgement.

House looks up at him, and shakes his head again. “But what if you’re wrong? What if it’s just some delusion you have that this will make everything right again? You could still find a way through medical school, get your qualification again. They’d call you a genius. Your family is still here.” He stops, then reluctantly adds, “I’d be here.”

“I’m not going through this again. I might be entertainment for you, but you don’t need me. He does. I have to try. No matter what. I have to. I can’t live the rest of my life here and just forget about everything else. It would end up exactly the same way, just a few years further down the line.”

There’s nothing House can say, and so he stands up and actually extends a hand to Wilson.

“Good luck,” he says.

Wilson stares at his hand for a moment, then slowly reaches out to take it. The handshake lasts for only a moment, and then Wilson pulls back and says, “House? I should get a last request, right?” He’s smiling.

House looks at him warily, trying to gauge the change in his mood. “That depends.”

“Just in case you’re right and I never get to do this.”

Wilson steps forward, places a steadying hand on House’s shoulder against the weight of his backpack, and leans in to kiss him on the mouth. He feels House’s lips part in surprise, but he doesn’t push the advantage. It’s really nothing more than curiosity and gratitude, at least here, in this place. But somehow, it helps to fix his resolve.

“Okay,” House says, when Wilson has let him go. “I probably won’t be telling Stacy about that either.”

“Goodbye, House,” Wilson says, and then decides to hug him after all.

He gets a taxi and takes it all the way out of town, southeast to Atlantic City. Partly because it amuses him to repeat the patterns of his former life, but it also serves the very real purpose of putting distance between himself and the hospital. It’s expensive, but he has more than enough cash for the trip. Finally, he directs the cab to stop in front of a hotel, and makes it wait while he confirms that there’s a vacancy. By the time he checks in, he’s exhausted and he just wants to sleep. He’s too tired to do anything tonight. Or maybe he’s just too scared. Either way, he just wants to lie down, to feel the space and the silence around him, to listen to the quiet in his own mind and ask himself one last time - are you sure about this? He takes a long shower, which is wonderful, and picks at a room-service dinner while watching the news. It’s almost the same life, he thinks. It could be almost the same. But he’s still grateful to pull back the covers and fall asleep.

 

***

 

It’s evening when he opens his eyes in the hospital bed. The blinds have been drawn, and fewer lights are on in the corridors. It’s also quieter. He sits in a pool of light from the fluorescent positioned almost directly above the bed, but the other side of the room is dark, the whiteboard empty. House must be between cases for the time being.

He thinks that everyone must have gone home and just forgotten to turn off the light - after all, he’s not going to complain about it in the morning. But after a long five minutes in the silence by the wall clock, House comes in. He notices Wilson’s eyes are open and comes to sit beside him.

“Might as well do a round while you’re awake,” House says, but Wilson gets the impression he’s really talking to himself. Not actually talking to Wilson, but at him. He gets up again, and there’s nothing Wilson can do to stop him.

House takes off the blankets with a dexterity that looks practiced, and then comes back around to take Wilson’s left arm. He’s hooked his cane over the edge of the bed in order to use both hands. Gently he extends Wilson’s arm, and then flexes it again, moving it through several angles of motion and repeating. He doesn’t talk while he does this. Maybe he’s finally run out of things to say. It’s easier for House to go clockwise in a circle around the bed rather than going directly across to doing the other arm, so he follows with Wilson’s left leg, then his right, before finally getting around to the opposite side. And Wilson realizes slowly that he can feel it, can feel his limbs bend and straighten as House manipulates them. He manages to flex a hand, with difficulty, but House is concentrating, not seeing him. Finally, House lets Wilson go and limps back around to settle the blankets again and pick up his cane. Wilson wonders how many times he’s done this, wonders how difficult it was to be quiet and patient enough to let the therapist show him how to do it properly. House sighs and sits on the edge of the bed, facing a little away from Wilson, his shoulders drawn. Wilson can see new lines in his face, and wonders exactly how many of them were caused by him. I’m doing my best, he wants to say.

“God, I’m tired,” House says, and Wilson gets that feeling again, that he’s talking to himself. But House is close enough that he thinks he might just be able to manage it, if he concentrates. He manages to slowly shuffle his left hand along the sheets until it brushes House’s leg. He has to tap it once, twice, three times before House looks down and over at him.

“Wilson?” House says, and he’s too exhausted for much in the way of hope, but Wilson blinks and taps his hand again. He struggles to move his head a little, to nod. House has taken his hand and is asking him to squeeze it. He manages only a slight pressure before he falters.

“Wilson, you have to stay with me this time, okay?” House says, and Wilson thinks that he has seen, after all, has known that Wilson has been here all along, as much as he could. House’s hand reaches up to brush his cheek gently, and Wilson’s eyes involuntarily start to fill with tears. He squeezes House’s hand again, but this time it’s an apology as the room is torn from him.

He wakes in the darkness, gasping for air.

 

***

 

Wilson has gone through the motions of one more day, but no last-minute revelation, no twist of fate, has come to change his mind. He’s thought it through as carefully as he can, and he feels only a small pang of guilt over what he’s going to do to this version of himself. He thinks - he hopes - that the ‘other’ Wilson has already moved on, which would explain why there was a space for him here in his time of need. For the time being, he seems to have taken the other Wilson’s life in addition to his own. However, he doesn’t think he can continue to be in two places at once for very much longer, and it’s important that he make some kind of decision before one is irrevocably made for him. He resists the urge to call House, to call David, to talk it over again. Instead, he spends a little more money on swimming trunks, and goes for a swim in the hotel pool. He takes a long walk outside, past the glare and glitz of the casino strip. He walks along the boardwalk and stares out at the ocean, watching the seagulls squabble over discarded scraps. For a moment, he thinks about walking into the sea. As the evening shadows begin to fall, he turns and goes back to the room.

Now he’s dressed himself carefully in a clean shirt and pants, a little rumpled, and that’s a shame, but it’s not important now. He sits on the edge of the bed, the case lying beside him on the coverlet. This morning, he stole an orange from the buffet and practiced until he was sure he could do everything he needed to do without faltering. The room has been made up today, and it’s all perfectly tidy, barely showing any trace of occupation besides the shoes arranged neatly under a chair and a few clothes and his backpack in the wardrobe. He’s registered under a false name, and has systematically dumped anything that could identify him during his walk. The drugs will raise questions and he’s doing his best to make sure none of it will ever be traced back to House. If he’s lucky, his body will never be identified at all.

In preparation for the injection, he’s unbuckled his pants and slid them down far enough to gain access to his thigh. He’s always hated needles, and it’s going to hurt, but it’s too late for that now. The pentobarbital needs to be delivered deeply into a large muscle, and in the absence of another pair of hands, it’ll have to do. He’s judged that he should have enough time to tidy himself up and lie down before it overcomes him. He hopes so.

He draws the liquid up into the hypodermic. The solution glints in the dim light of the room as he positions the tip of the needle against his thigh. He says a quick, undirected prayer, and presses down.

 

***

 

When he wakes, the television is on. Again. A woman is crying and screaming and a man is yelling at her. Wilson swears that if he gets out of this he’s never going to watch another second of General Hospital, ever again. He lies there, feeling the cool sheets against his limbs, the soft give of the pillow under his head. He can smell food, and he opens his eyes and turns towards it. House is drinking a bottle of orange juice, his attention fixed on the screen, and there’s an empty paper bag on the bed, stained with grease. Wilson can actually taste a lingering remnant of the orange juice on his tongue. He looks around a little and recognizes the isolation room, the whiteboard, the couch, the extra lines on House’s face that mark him as ‘his’. A huge, sweeping relief floods through him.

He moves a hand slightly, but the onscreen crying and yelling has deteriorated into tearful reconciliation, and House isn’t paying attention. It takes all his concentration, but he manages to gather lips and tongue and breath together and focus them into one point. He’s grateful that he isn’t on a respirator this time.

“House.”

It comes out softly and a little slurred, but it’s there. Only House, damn him, doesn’t seem to appreciate his efforts at all.

“House,” he tries again, and it sounds a little better this time, although his throat is dry and he still sounds like he’s on his fifth glass of wine.

Then he sees House’s brow furrow as he turns his head, and Wilson smiles, knowing that at long last, he’s been heard.


End file.
